The wireless industry reported 25.2 million new subscribers, its largest one-year addition of new subscribers in its more than 20-year commercial history, according to CTIA’s semi-annual industry survey released this week at the CTIA Wireless I.T. and Entertainment Show.
Steve Largent, president and chief executive officer of the association, said the U.S. wireless penetration stands at about 65 percent and questioned the notion that the U.S. wireless industry is mature.
“When you look at countries in other parts of the world with penetration rates exceeding 100 percent, it’s only logical to predict that subscriber growth in the U.S. is far from over,” he said.
The survey also found a large increase in short message service traffic and revenue from data services. In June, more than 7.2 billion SMS messages were sent on wireless networks, compared with 2.8 billion SMS messages sent in June 2004. Revenue from text messaging increased 154 percent to $1.24 billion from last year, said the survey.
In addition, the survey found six-month data revenue for services such as music and content downloads, games and Web access reached nearly $3.8 billion in June of this year, up 85 percent from June of last year.
